Heretofore, the above operation was performed manually by an operator who simultaneously picked up a blank from each of two stacks of blanks located on each side of the operator, overlapped the blanks ensuring that each side of the blank faces the right way (the fabric having an "outer" face and an "inner" face with respect to the garment to be produced), fed the overlapping blanks to the sewing machine which sews the crotch portion of the garment, and the finished garment is then collected and reassembled for a further operation on the garment.
There are a number of problems associated with the above manual process.
Each stack of blanks is obtained by cutting a strip of fabric which is in concertina formation such that, resultantly, the side facing the operator alternates. This means that every second blank on the stack on both sides of the operator has to be turned by the operator so that a correct match is obtained for the garment, it being understood that the fabric has an "outer" and "inner" surface with respect to the garment. The necessity to remember to turn each second blank manually after picking up said blank from on the two stacks is quite onerous on the operator and too often results in mismatches rendering the garment useless.
There is a further problem with respect to the simultaneous picking up of a limp fabric blank from each of two stacks of such blanks. Invariably, more than one blank is picked up by the operator which results in a slowing down of the process.
Furthermore, the simultaneous picking up of a blank from two stacks one on each side of the operator is ergonomically onerous on the operator and often results in RSI problems.
There is a further problem with the sewn blanks after the sewing step, where a further necessary step must be involved, that being the collection and restacking in a consistent manner of the garments ready for the next operation.
Furthermore, due to the short cycle time for this operation, many pick-ups, turn-overs and stack-asides were necessary, this aggravating the possibility of RSI problems of the operator.